Bruce County council looked at a report that is the precursor to the 2025 Budget.
Staff presented the 2025-2029 budget on Thursday, which is focusing on incorporating the county’s major plans, including the Asset Management Plan, The Indigenous Reconciliation Framework, and the 2023-2026 Strategic Plan.
Director of Corporate Services Sam Dinsmore says that inflation is top-of-mind, but won’t have as much of an impact that it did last year.
“Inflation can have a large impact on our budget. Two to three percent [is what] staff feel is a good starting point. We’re past that large inflation that we saw post-COVID, and now we’re starting to see things level off, but still looking at that two-to-three percent year-to-year-change.”
County staff has been able to create a plan that will help close the infrastructure gap, which is the difference between the County’s expenses and fund received from the province. At this point, the Bruce County Staff are hoping to have that gap closed between 2029 and 2033.
“The main message that we wanted to take away from this is ‘stick to the plan.’ The fact that the county is able to close that gap in a 15-year period is quite remarkable. The number 1 message is to stick to that plan.”
Meanwhile, Dinsmore talked about Development Charges. The 2024 Budget introduced DCs at the beginning of the year with a phase-in approach, starting at 25% of the total amount that will go into effect by 2031.
“With Development Charges, the [Development Charges] Act is very specific. The municipality, or in this case the county, is not allowed to force one developer to pay another developer’s DCs. So what that means is that the phase-in exemption or credit that is given by the county must be made up by the county using something other than development charges,” said Dinsmore. “For 2024, staff are forecasting that the year-end surplus will be sufficient to cover that cost. So what’ll happen is that 75% that the county didn’t collect from those developers, the surplus will then be transferred into the DC reserve funds to offset that 75%, which fulfills the county’s legislative requirements.”
The 2025 Budget is expected to be presented to council at their October 10th meeting.